


Once upon a dream

by Iron_Mad



Category: The Old Guard (Movie 2020)
Genre: Canon-Typical Violence, Crusades Era Joe | Yusuf al-Kaysani & Nicky | Nicolò di Genova, Enemies to Friends, Gen, I believe it's clear that Nicky is on the wrong side of history, M/M, Not Beta Read, POV Nicky | Nicolò di Genova, Visions in dreams, in the long run
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-10-06
Updated: 2020-10-06
Packaged: 2021-03-08 01:01:56
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,130
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26857141
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Iron_Mad/pseuds/Iron_Mad
Summary: Nicolò di Genova dies from fever one night in a ship to the Holy Land.He wakes up the next morning.
Relationships: Joe | Yusuf Al-Kaysani/Nicky | Nicolò di Genova
Kudos: 30





	Once upon a dream

**Author's Note:**

> Tw: vomiting, graphic violence.  
> \------
> 
> Hello again! Wrote this during the summer, let me know what you think :)

The first time he dreamed of them was during the trip to the Holy Land. Weeks spent at the basement of the ship, filled with comrades and ammunition for the siege alike. All of the soldiers sleeping side by side, waiting and praying. 

One of those nights Nicolò fell ill, feeling weak and feverish. For three days shudders racked his flesh and his teeth clattered between lips cracked from the shorthand of fresh water. Fear overcame him that this was it, the end. He would never be able to complete his mission and kiss the soil of Jerusalem. His breath grew short at the thought. 

_Father of all, amidst the heavenly skies, please keep me in Your grace a little longer._

He prayed silently for what felt like hours, some in his mother tongue, some he had read in Latin. Prayed through the Rosario, imagining the smooth beads beneath his sweaty fingers. Nicolò prayed until his thoughts grew muddled and eyes heavy and he succumbed to darkness. 

* * *

Flashes beneath his eyelids. 

Two women riding under the hot sun. One moment fighting, deadly and precise, and the next sharing a meal besides the fire. Sleeping intertwined under the stars. 

Light dances across his vision. The plane swifts, showing a dark-skinned man walking through the market. At home, throwing his head back and laughing. On his knees, head bowed to touch the rug underneath him. 

* * *

He gasped awake. 

* * *

Weeks passed and Nicolò was getting tired. 

Tired of watching his brothers dying, tired of the screaming and the fires. The dreams and the sleepless nights in the barracks. 

Seeing and hearing the same man, again and again, his dark hair, sharp eyes, melodic voice and curved blade _._ Why did he continue to see him? Was it a message from God, as he was getting closer to the city? Was it his destiny to kill this Arab?

_I will find you._

He couldn't answer these questions but maybe he would die trying. 

* * *

The battle was like any other. Loud and filthy and no different from the rest. He had blood on his boots from where an opponent had fallen after he sliced at his chest and bile on his pants from where he had knelt to hold a dying comrade. Sweat ran from his hair down to his temples, his eyes stung and his mouth tasted like ash. 

Nicolò panted hard as he discarded the soldier before him and turned as he heard shuffling behind him. One of his brothers was locked in a duel, having intercepted a blow for Nicolò before it could reach him, saving him from a backstabbing. He watched suddenly, as the tip of a sword broke through the skin of the crusader's back, the armor and the once white tunic, spraying droplets of blood at his cheeks and beard.

With one swift motion, the sword was pulled back with a sickening noise and the body of his comrade collapsed. Nicolò raised his longsword with two hands, feeling the enemy slicing at his leg, and with all of his strength decapitated the man. 

For a moment, he stood over the two corpses, watching the blood that spilled slowly but surely on the ground. With his thigh throbbing, he dropped his head and recited Pater Noster for his friend and savior, begging God for mercy. Afterwards, he raised his eyes, scanning the battlefield only to find a man panting and leaning on his curved blade, staring at him from a little further. 

Not any man. He may be battered and bruised but he was the one he saw at night for months. At the beginning of those dreams, he thought them the result of his fever breaking. When they continued, he felt like he was going insane; like it was a test of his belief. Now, with the two of them opposite on the battlefield, swords in hand and recognition in their eyes, the path was clear. 

_Finally._

They stepped towards each other. 

* * *

_Slice and block. Side step and block again._

The blade glints dangerously close to his eyes as he steps back. A growl leaves his throat as he lunges forward and misses. For a moment, he feels like they are dancing. 

_Block, turn. Side step -_

* * *

They were on the ground, each trying to get the upper hand. Both had lost their swords a while back, the foreigner having tripped on the reigns of a dead horse. His hand had shot out and with a fist on the red cross on his chest, he took Nicolò with him. The breath had been knocked out of them at first but soon they were both wrestling on the ground like animals. 

The other man had managed to straddle Nicolò, pining him down and strangling him with both hands. He tried his hardest to throw him, get him off, bucking and scratching at his arms and face but his breath was getting shallower. He moved his left hand to the side desperately, punching him in the ribs and the infidel grunts but doesn't relent. He stretched his arm outwards, searching for his sword, _anything_ useful, before his fingers curled around a rock. If only he could-

The blade of a dagger sunk into his breast, just as he brought the rock on the man's temple with the last of his strength. The soldier crumpled to the side, falling besides him, motionless. Nicolò still couldn't breathe, wheezing as he choked on his own blood. A strange kind of warmth started filling his sternum, like a small sun rising from his solar plexus. The soul, leaving his body. 

_At least I took him with me_ , he thought, just before his eyes closed. 

* * *

He woke up. 

Nicolò coughed and opened his eyes to a clouded sky. Disoriented and trembling, he tried to sit up, only for vertigo to overcome him. He turned to his side, retching. 

The same blood filled soil greeted him and Nicolò shivered. He wondered if this was hell. If he had returned to the battlefield as a place of eternal nightmares. 

He lay back on his backside, filled with terror, and turned his head to the right, searching for his opponent. The corpse was still there, on it's back where it had fallen. 

The chest was moving. 

_No. No, no, no, this can't be happening._

The man moaned, fingers twitching, as his eyes moved behind his eyelids. He opened them and looked at the sky, while Nicolò watched, stunned. His brow furrowed and his head turned to the left, looking right at him and freezing. Nicolò saw the same confusion in his widened eyes, the same impossible fear. 

_Might have more in common than we believed,_ Nicolò thought nonsensically, just as the other man lunged for his knife and charged at him. 

**Author's Note:**

> Comments help me fill the void in my soul :)


End file.
